camp; Leslie's anxiety therefore on her account was at an end. And,
after lunch, while Nicholls and Simpson went blithely to work upon the
job of provisioning and watering the cutter, and stowing their several
personal belongings on board, Leslie and Marshall took the catamaran and
sailed round to the cove, from whence they proceeded to the cave, where
they found Turnbull and his two companions still bound hard and fast,
and by this time thoroughly subdued. With some difficulty they
succeeded in getting the three prisoners down the face of the cliff and
aboard the catamaran; and, this done, their transference to the
_Minerva_ and their confinement in irons was an easy matter. The owners
of the barque had made the grave mistake of sending her to sea without
so much as a single weapon of any kind to aid her officers, if need be,
to maintain order and discipline among the crew; but this was an
omission that Leslie was fortunately in a position to easily remedy by a
simple application to the case of firearms that had formed part of the
_Mermaid's_ cargo, and he willingly supplied Marshall with a brace of
revolvers and a sufficient quantity of ammunition for all practical
purposes. The party from the island--that is to say, Flora, Leslie,
Nicholls, and Simpson--accepted a very pressing invitation from Marshall
to dine and spend the evening on board the _Minerva_ in celebration of
that vessel's recovery from the mutineers; and before they left again
for the shore Captain Marshall made a long entry in the ship's official
log, detailing the circumstances of her seizure and recapture, with full
particulars of the part played by the steward in the latter--much to
Reynolds' gratification; and Leslie attached his signature to the entry,
in attestation of its truth. Leslie also seized the opportunity to
compare the chronometer saved from the _Mermaid_ with those belonging to
the _Minerva_, and was much gratified to find that it was absolutely to
be relied upon. They returned to the camp about midnight, and turned in
highly elated with the joyous knowledge that on the morrow they would
actually be starting for home.

As may be supposed, the whole party were early astir next morning;
Nicholls and Simpson wending their way to the woods to collect a stock
of fruit for the first few days of the voyage, while Flora prepared
breakfast, and Leslie overhauled the entire camp to satisfy himself that
he was not leaving behind him anythi